.webp?h=8 "Merry Fistmas!")
To discuss your weekly readings of books, textbooks and papers. !bookworms
I'm finnishing Never Let Me Go, I haven't read any thing for a couple of weeks even though the book club ended.
I also bought 2 editions of Charles Darwin's On The Origin of the Species 
First I ordered the 6th edition and then the first edition which arrived today and is shown in the pic above. Yes I'm aware Darwin's book is outdated as he had no knowledge of genetics but I bought them as they're still interesting as history of science and to see how much of the original theory still stands, also the cover and illustrations are so pretty.
These pics are from the 6th edition I got, very collectible editions even if they're translations. !historychads
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I ordered a copy of Columbine by Dave Cullen yesterday because the
shooter got me googling it's apparently a very good book so we're going to see how that goes when it gets here in a couple hours 
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Why is the guy who voiced Optimus Prime writing children's books
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Love these threads.
I finished A Mad Catastrophe about Austria-Hungary in the lead up, and in WWI recommended to me by a dramatard. It was great, I really enjoyed it. My only complaint is there weren't more maps. There were lots.of troops and army movements I found difficult to follow because it has one base map seemingly per chapter, and a bunch of Podunk eastern euro towns I had never heard of as description points.
Still absolutely great.
Now I'm reading The Great Siege of Malta 1565 about the Turks against the Knights of St John. It's older being written in the 60s. It's very good, but I am slightly dubious about the details. There's a lot of direct quotes and attributions that I doubt the accuracy of. Full paragraphs written as a direct quote from a Turkish war council by an 80 year old pirate who then sleeps in the trenches with the men. Just seems a bit embellished.
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Hello, I'm the one who recommended to you Wawro's Mad Catastrophe. Glad you enjoyed it and really gratified you followed through. Easily on of my favorite books, really sheds a light that most people, even those interested in history, do not see in WWI.
I agree with you on the maps, but wew does he paint a picture everywhere else.
Democracy is the art and science of running the circus from the monkey cage.
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WARHAMMER 40K: KRIEG!!!
I thought this one was gonna be the most edgelordiest book amongst warhammer, which in itself would be an achievement amongst 40k books
But instead i experienced some really great characters involved in the atomic annialation of a future world and their descent into madness and barbaric war, was pretty fricking great, 40k doesnt deserve such a good story in its ranks
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About halfway through my reread of A Storm of Swords, though I cant stand Jon so those chapters take a while. I'm also starting the Winds of Dune.
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ISHYGDDT
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They might not be as good as the first book but all the rest of the main series is about on par with Brian's writings. I am fine with reading mediocre stories if I like the world, I have read over 150 Warhammer 40k novels and about 70-80 Dragonlance books and only like half of the 40k books were good and most of the Dragonlance ones were bad.
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I'm halfway through The Screwtape Letters
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Are you liking it so far? There's a really good payoff in the end.
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I'm reading two books, one is the Bible, which I detailed yesterday.
The other one is Dictatorship, by Carl Schmitt. It's pretty dang dense, but a podcast I listen to turned me onto Schmitt's book as he was the legal architect of the Nazi regime. This guy did everything so by the book that the Allies couldn't nail him after the war with anything criminal. Overall, I share pretty much none of the beliefs of Schmitt but I do recognize him as a greater philosopher and researcher on legal topics than I am.
Another thing that makes this guy fascinating is that he was unrepentant in the end in terms of nazism, but at the same time wrote a famous Jewish philosopher (Leo Strauss) his walking papers because he didn't think he should be pogrom'd by the nazis. (Wikipedia has since been heavily edited, and I cannot source too well Strauss's and Schmitt's relationship.)
Democracy is the art and science of running the circus from the monkey cage.
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I haven't read a single
page of my books 
for the exams I have in two weeks
What's a good book on best ways to cope with failure
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Starting "The Country of Ice Cream Star," a post apocalyptic novel where everyone consistently dies by 18 due to an endemic plague, and most knowledge is lost or limited. The characters, including the first person narrator, are black kids who speak a heavy dialect of fantasy ebonics (how did the mayofoid author get away with this one)
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I have continued my trip through the works of Ishiguro. Klara and the Sun was a cute book, but fairly odd in many ways. Klara is probably his most likable protagonist yet, no doubt done somewhat ironically since she's a robot. He did a good bit of work trying to create a unique non-human narration style, and I think he succeeded in that respect. Learning about the world through Klara's eyes is interesting, although like other Ishiguro works, ultimately little of the mystery matters beyond the emotions it evokes in the characters. Still, I think this one might have needed a bit more time in the oven. Much of what we learn about the side characters ranges from tropes to just completely confusing and irrelevant. The ending seems to be controversial. I think it was ok. I don't know or care enough about religion to speak on those themes, but they're certainly there if you want to see his take on them.
And though I planned to stop there, I'm glad I didn't. The Remains of the Day caught my interest, and I now think it's a modern masterpiece. If you could only read one of his books, it should be this one. We should retroactively go back and undo the book club because Never Let Me Go sucks butt in comparison. An absolutely beautiful and crushing take on regret and one's sense of duty. A must read.
I'm about halfway through When We Were Orphans now. Most people seem to think it's his worst. I can understand why, but still an enjoyable read so far.
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Agreed, The Remains of the Day was so much better and so incredibly gloomy
. Stevens was a depressing character and a cautionary tale of man to afraid to engage in a relationship or actually do something, literally anything not just Miss Kenton, he even refused to give his lordship a good advice and just remains shut while he cuddles with nazis, Stevens knew it could damage his reputation and never brought it up not even once, also the chapter of the dinner with the family after his car ran out of gas was so uncomfortable. His breakdown with the old man at the pier near the end was sadder than Ruth struggling through her donations in NLMG (at least Ruth complained about their situation instead of just taking it as normal like and Kathy did).
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The Lord Darlington plot is so good. It's very easy to support a man who wants to ease the terms of Versailles if you know any history, even if he's only an old fashioned genleman outside his depth. It makes total sense he winds up being tricked into becoming a Nazi sympathizer. He never changed, the world changed and no one could convince him of it. He never came across as a bad guy.
And Mr. Stevens, what a punch at the end. He's so convincing at the start, you actually kind of buy into his whole dignity through servitude thing. Even when he worked through his father dying, I still kind of respected him in a weird way even though I knew his choice was ridiculous. Then that meeting with Ms. Kenton and his breakdown on the pier. God, such a brutal reality check.
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Yeah, Darlington was sort of a naive guy who ended up serving as a useful idiot. But one should consider Mr. Stevens is not a reliable narrator, he mentioned Darlington ordered him to fire the jewish staff and while remembering that episode Stevens is trying really hard to paint his employer in the best light as possible. The part where his father dies is interesting, Darlington asks Stevens if he's crying. Als, while I know Anthony Hopkins played him the film, I imagined Peter O'Toole as Stevens, I don't know why but it fitted well in my imagination.
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What?
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dark psychology secrets. i need to learn how to manipulate women better.
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Kitchen Confidential
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If On a Winter's Night a Traveller.
I haven't had much time to read it, so I'm not far in, but boy this story about the guy at the station sure is interesting, I can't wait to see how that goes
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This is even worse than a Lawlz thread
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Finishing 3 body rn
Gonna go to the bookstore and get the sequel tomorrow
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